Xenoblade 2 Announced!

WOO!

Cautious yay.  1 Were the other game's 1st trailers in the meta series this vague?  
I suppose the cryptic lines help add a sense of mystery, & possibly builds hype, but the title alone could have done that.  I simultaneously have nothing & something to go on.  
2 Why is the possible plot, background details for this game not in the trailer but elsewhere?
3 Can Tetsuya Takahashi work on 2 games/series simultaneously, or has XCX been strangely abandoned?
4 I suspect this game is post XB, so what's Elysium?
5 Is Takahashi ever going to go back & use Enneagrams as bases for his character's personalities?

I think from the mixed reactions I've seen on Twitter, this opener has been received with more skepticism than any of the other games. As far as its vagueness compared to the other games, I XBX's reveal trailer was also pretty vague. XB2's one drew me into the story a bit more. After XBX's reveal I was able to stay away from news about it, but for some reason XB2's reveal gave me a bit of an itch that's hard to scratch.

So, if you look in the trailer at around 0:55, scripts are posted in the background. Since fans aren't documenting their sources very well, this was very hard to tell at first. I try to withold judgement about things until they come from on high though. I assume you're referring to the information people have built this page out of? http://xenoblade.wikia.com/wiki/Xenoblade_Chronicles_2

The decision to move to a different title from XBX has seemed strange to me, but for a creator to take a break from a property for a while doesn't spell the end of it. (See also Ano's thoughts on Shin Godzilla allowing him to take a break from Eva so he'd be interested in going back to Eva).

Taking a look around https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elysium and thinking of the movie Elysium, https://youtu.be/oIBtePb-dGY and knowing Monolith's record of criticizing the elite (see Zeal Kingdom from Chrono Trigger, Solarians in Xenogears, Ormus in Xenosaga), I imagine it might be a place not unlike Solaris? But that's just a guess. There seems to be some sort of imagery with a floating island, which there were lots of in the Eryth Sea area in XB1. Seeing as the High Entia had a bit of a classism problem (in the same way the Solarians did), I imagine it might not have been entirely stamped out, even with Zanza's defeat. (Every generation and every culture seems to have a problem with classism, and criticism of classism has always been in Monolith's narratives. It also be a straw-man for attacking Japanese nationalism through the use of complex metaphors in slightly less direct a way Ghost in the Shell does).

Seeing as I never really fully dove deep into Enneagrams outside of reading the ones assigned to my favs from the older series, I have absolutely no idea?

Adding to this, do people have opinions about the art style they chose for this game? I know there was a lot of criticism for how Tanaka's art was modeled in XBX, but even though this style seems a bit moe, I think it models much more gracefully, especially on the girls. I'm hoping for some more interesting-looking older characters of course, though, but that's just me.

I have written in several of these threads that Xenoblade was my favorite series, yet this game looks SOOOOOOOO bad. I couldn't believe I wasn't hyped after this trailer, but I wasn't.

Getting rid of the series character designer (at least for Gears, Saga Episode 1, and XCX) is a bad decision imo. They characters look like generic anime characters which infuriates me.

The story seems to be a typical escort person from A to B. Sure, twists and turns are sure to change that, but that in a Xeno story? That's the story you have for the trailer?..... *Sigh*

From what I can tell, armor changing from XC and X, and weapon and class changing from X appear to be gone. Yet again, it may all be early footage, but come on! Customization in the Xenoblade series is just as staple to the Blade series as big worlds. Also, no mechs..... whatsoever. You had Faces in XC and Skells in X.

As of right now I can't be excited for this because this is NOT Xenoblade. And I feel I need to emphasize the dull looking anime characters again........ it was bad. This game fell flat for someone who absolutely loves the Blade series.

they waited this many years to finally make one & the graphics are crappy.

I guess I'm the only one really looking forward to this unabashedly. I do hope it's good, though. There's always a chance that it won't be. (I actually ended up feeling like the models in Xenoblade X all looked like MOK-KOS after a while, so while the waifu style seems very generic by comparison, I think it's a step up.)

But the new character models look like Tales Of, or an Atlus jrpg. It's a style that's been done to death and it's SOOOOOOO boring to look at. Nothing at all in that trailer wowed me. It looked like Xeno X with generic anime characters, no weapon or armor changing, and no mechs. Also are you saying the characters looked like Xenosaga characters is a bad thing (granted like next gen Xenosaga characters with a higher poly count, high res textures, shaders, ect)? I like it and it feels very Monolith Soft.

But trust me, I hope I'm wrong. Mario 3D World had a terrible first trailer and it was amazing! Trust me when I say I'm hoping like hell this is another home run. I just emotionally flatlined on the trailer which is another entry to my favorite series.

I gotcha.

I'm guilty as charged for actually liking the Tales and Atlus styles, though. I know that Xeno has usually been the one to go a different way with their art, and I get that people aren't into the more generic style. It just, I guess, I really just want to like everything Monolith does, because I've liked it all in the past.

About Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (may I just call it ‘’XC2’’ ?) :

In my opinion, according to this short trailer, I have the unpleasant feeling that XC2 won’t be ambitious. And I fear that this game will be developped in a rushed way (the scheduled release date is 2017, which seems rather short for a "true" Xeno game).

Chara-design also bothers me a bit. I don't mind about anime-style chara-design such as the chara-design in the Tales of series. I am a huge fans of the Shining series after all (Shining Wind, Shining Hearts...). But…in a "true" Xeno game, i.e. a game with philosophical and religious references, such chara-design seems...I dont know how to express it..."inappropriate" in a way. And please, about the characters and the plot : no "harem" plot. Please. It's OK in a Shining game or in an anime, but certainly not in a “true” Xeno game.

About MonolithSoft+Nintendo :

I am currently playing Zelda BOTW (WiiU version), and I really enjoy it. It's been a long time since I was not so motivated to play a game. As Xenoblade Chronicles X (XCX), this game is developped by MonolithSoft+Nintendo. It contains some great gameplay mechanics. Some of those mechanics are obviously inherited from XCX. But the fun is more present IMO in Zelda BOTW, probably because there are more secrets, more surprises, and the gameplay is more various in general.

I really hope that Zelda BOTW will motivate MonolithSoft+Nintendo to develop more ambitious games. And yeah, I say it again, I don’t have the feeling that XC2 will be ambitious.
And I also hope that MonolithSoft will soon work on a game with a good scenario. A scenario such as the one in Xenosaga would be the best for me, but it looks like MonolithSoft want to be the Japanese Bethesda*, which implies many open-world games, and it's obvious that conciliating great scenario and open-world is quite a challenge (XCX is a perfect example).



* Bethesda is the company behind games such as The Elder Scrolls :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Bethesda_Softworks_video_games

I think as this develops, here are the things I hope for Xenoblade 2:

- That it's not a harem romance story
- That it's not an overwhelming open world game
- That the story is at least a return to form on the level with Xenogears

Even though I have no problem with other game series being about waifu/husbando-choosing (see me and Fire Emblem Fates), I'm hoping it doesn't go that way for XB2's main story. It'd be okay in a spinoff or omake thing, though.

It seems that just about every game that comes out these days is this crazy sprawling open world sandbox ever since Skyrim has come out. While I enjoyed Xenoblade X, I think its bigness worked to undermine its story, and I hope that isn't carried into XB2. XBX had more hooks in a Xenosaga-like story organization, but there's so much not filled out yet. I'm more hoping for a sequel/supplemental materials for XBX than anything else, because that can't possibly be everything.

Getting a game with Xenosaga's plot complexity would be extremely nice. It does look like it has a short development cycle, but the Xenosaga games also had very short development cycles (There were only 4 years between XSI and XSIII, including the spinoffs). Then again, there was a wave of creative momentum that carried over between Xenogears and Xenosaga that go in the same direction when it came to Xenoblade, so anything could happen. Games that are given longer development cycles tend to flounder and lose focus (see FFXV despite the fact that I like it a lot), so maybe the shorter cycle will result in a game that comes with the creative spark the older games did.

Valkyrie wrote: but it looks like MonolithSoft want to be the Japanese Bethesda*

I am saying this due to an interview of MonolithSoft in 2012 :
Xenoblade Developer, Monolith Soft, Want To Be Like Bethesda Softworks
http://www.siliconera.com/2012/12/14/inspired-by-bethesda-softworks-monolith-soft-looks-forward-to-jumping-into-the-next-gen/
" Inaba: Our goal is to become something like the developers of the Fallout series, Bethesda Softworks. ”

I'm not really hyped nor do I think it will be terrible. I'm just in a state in-between. I guess I'm still baffled that the game is coming so soon after X.

But what I am stoked about is the soundtrack. Yasunori Mitsuda has been hyping it up on Twitter. It already sounds like he'll have more involvement than the original Xenoblade (well, he only did the ending theme in that one, but still).

Yeah, I'm pretty much kind of like Jintoki on this. Neutral. I expect it to be decent and entertaining, but it won't be as good as Xenogears/Xenosaga was to me, most likely. The whole Xenoblade series has been pretty much miss for me. I'm just more into that whole old school JRPG with a convoluted and dark story. And as others have said before me, it seems Monolith Soft has gone in a more... Bethesda-y direction, which I just totally am not into whatsoever. (I can't really get into modern gaming in general for this reason. I guess I'll always be a biased, nostalgic idiot.)

I'll still get a Switch for it though. Just to see.

As for the art style, it doesn't really bother me so much. I mean, I am disappointed that the old art designer from Xenogears, some of Xenosaga, and Xenoblade X isn't returning, but I like Tales games and their aesthetics. It does look pretty and sleek, though I think, from what I've seen thus far, at least... the setting AROUND the characters doesn't fit at all. It's too realistic and complex and clashes horribly.

I'm probably still going to buy a nintendo switch for Xenoblade 2 even though I know there's probably never going to be another Xeno game on the level of Xenogears or Xenosaga Episode 3. I have been putting some time into the Xenoblade games lately and even though they're nowhere near as deep as the previous Xeno games I still find them to be very fun and enjoyable to play. I'll probably be watching out for if they release a collector's edition again like they did with Xenoblade X a few years ago.

So any reactions to the 2nd story trailer? Did it change any of your minds?

Seems at least 1 va might be from the U.K.
The zohar shape appears again, is it a motif in the Xeno works?
If the red haired blade is named Pyrrha, then who's Homura?
Any speculation on what a Blade is this time around, & what it means to be a driver of Aegis, as well as what is Aegis?
I'm never clear if Pyrrha can also turn into a Blade/Sword, can she?
What about the possible identity/nature of the Architect?
So many characters looking similar to past ones. Who's that Yelv (XCX) looking masked man?
That vaguely Gaignun (XS) looking guy, the other wearing a commissar Cap, are they both rivals, antagonists?
Is that 1 guy with a scruffy beard, + glowing blue sword at 2:36?
Who's that person turning their head away from the flames at 2:48?

Any reactions to possible new party members, light purple hair person, orange outfit pale hair person + their white feline beast, nopon.

Had trouble making out some audio, the opening narration Everyone in ? lived in the world tree together w our divine father the architect.

You & that sword can’t be, was there something else at the end?

That blade you call pyrrha, unintelligble.

Did anyone make out the male PC's name? His Va varies in quality, from sounding good/okay to cringey.

The Main Character Designer Masatsugu Saito's designs seeminly only showed up twice before, I think he was leaning more torward his Expelled from Paradise designs here, they look good still, not that great modeled. His Cyborg 009 Call of Justice designs however were probably modified to fit that work's general aesthetic, they also looked nice.

I think I was most shocked to see Tetsuya Nomura being involved at all, unless I'm mistaken in believing they're the same Nomura that works for Square Enix. Could anyone see what this person was designing? Torna, Forma?

I think this may have the worst voice acting ive heard in a long time.

Think this looks like a step backward for Monolithsoft if anything.

There games have pretty much got progressively worse, well at least Xenoblade was ambitious in its own way though I felt overall the story was pretty weak.

Haven't played X yet but it looks interesting at least. This looks like a kids game, doesn't bode well, though could surprise me and be good in it's own way.

I do hope they make a proper mature and dark game again though that seems more and more unlikely.

It's been a while and I don't have a ton of time, but I wanted to get at some of these.

So any reactions to the 2nd story trailer? Did it change any of your minds?

The story trailer actually intrigued me, especially with seeing some older, non-moe characters. If the story is good, I will suffer a moe anime style. I did it for Madoka and I can do it for this. Something about a response to a question about the art style change has be disappointed, though:

https://mynintendonews.com/2017/06/15/tetsuya-takahashi-shares-a-message-about-xenoblade-chronicles-2-with-the-fans/

I’ll leave the stories about the solemn old men and hot stylish guys to someone else(even though there’s way more demand for that stuff), and go ahead with this.

I guess I'm one of the few, the proud, the people who are here for the stories about the solemn old men. I'm willing to believe that this comment doesn't have a whole lot of weight to it (or I'm overthinking it too much) and I'll still find something I like in this game, but it's really hard for me not to be discouraged reading this. After years of hanging on after many older fans have brushed off Xenoblade as a series, I'm wondering if it's my turn for my fire to go out with this entry. I really hope not, and I'm not giving up, but I am discouraged by these words, even if it is something I've misconstrued, I want to be proven that I'm wrong with this. I've started looking around for the next thing I can devote myself to long-term, but I might just come back around to sticking with my love of the older games.

Seems at least 1 va might be from the U.K.
The zohar shape appears again, is it a motif in the Xeno works?
If the red haired blade is named Pyrrha, then who's Homura?

Pyra seems to be the english localization for Homura, so they are the same - http://xenoblade.wikia.com/wiki/Pyra Though I do think Pyrrha seems like a much more likely mythological connection ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrrha ), I think it's just an attempt by localization to infer the name's meaning more literally for the English-speaking user.

From other articles I've been reading around the net, I think XB2's localization is taking place at Nintendo EU, so I'm expecting a majority British cast, wHICH I THINK IS VERY COOL but it would be nice to have a throwback VA in there, like how Michael McConnohie (Margulis) came back to be Nagi in XBX.

I have a dumb theory about the Zohar shapes and that particular color - when I scrubbed around for Xenogears lore in 2015 for my stupid fanfic, I noticed a distinct correlation between green and red imagery in regards to a freed/uninhibited Wave Existence.

https://youtu.be/jjlXzOCUWlY

In this video, there is a slightly more yellowish green used, but I think the color used to represent higher dimensional entities has stayed similar from Gears on through Blade. It's the same color as chaos' eyes - http://www.behindthevoiceactors.com/_img/chars/chaos-xenosaga-episode-iii-also-sprach-zarathustra-85.1.jpg , and Alvis' true form - https://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/xenoblade/images/8/81/Alvis_green.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/180?cb=20160326172850 and even Elma has a red and green nod, although it's more subtle - https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/3f/17/5e/3f175e7e50d09cfa9b75b81117bff81f.jpg

TL;DR, I think the green signifies a connection to a much higher power.

Any speculation on what a Blade is this time around, & what it means to be a driver of Aegis, as well as what is Aegis?
I'm never clear if Pyrrha can also turn into a Blade/Sword, can she?

Since I'm thinking about this from a Xenogears perspective, I think the Blade might be someone who has innate power, but cannot act on it alone, and an Aegis is someone who has no power but can request it from a Blade? Not sure what the consent structure on this will be (also the seemingly outdated gender dynamic that Pyra and Rex put forth as the main two) but that's just my feeling about it.

As for Pyra's sword-form, I have no idea. *_*

My lunch is up but I'll try to answer the others when I can, because I am interested.

Anyone played this yet? im trying to look past the chibi Anime style and MMO gameplay and hoping there is a good story in there somewhere.

All anyone seems to be talking about is Pyra's boobies.

I'm in Chapter 5 right now, and while the costume designs bother me quite a lot, the story is coming out much stronger and bolder than Xenoblade X. There's a loooooooooot of Xenogears references that are making my heart skip a beat. I'm not done yet, but if you have a Switch, I recommend it. The combat doesn't flow like Xenoblade 1's does, but I do think it's a very worthy entry in the series.

I think the thing that bothers me most about the revealing costumes is that I don't think I'll ever have the guts to cosplay these really gorgeous characters because of how much of their bodies are exposed. These characters are written amazingly and their agency is stellar, but I'm not going to pass this game to my 10 year old nephew, but I wouldn't pass Xenogears or Xenosaga to him, either.

katimus_prime wrote:I'm in Chapter 5 right now, and while the costume designs bother me quite a lot, the story is coming out much stronger and bolder than Xenoblade X.  There's a loooooooooot of Xenogears references that are making my heart skip a beat.  I'm not done yet, but if you have a Switch, I recommend it.  The combat doesn't flow like Xenoblade 1's does, but I do think it's a very worthy entry in the series.

I think the thing that bothers me most about the revealing costumes is that I don't think I'll ever have the guts to cosplay these really gorgeous characters because of how much of their bodies are exposed.  These characters are written amazingly and their agency is stellar, but I'm not going to pass this game to my 10 year old nephew, but I wouldn't pass Xenogears or Xenosaga to him, either.

currently half way through chapter 4 (lack of time Xd)

still haven't summoned Kos damn >_<

anyways i got the xenoblade switch pro controller, its pretty great.

Must admit despite my initial misgivings im pretty hyped for this, and the character design has grown on me.

Some of the character designs look really cool actually, especially the females, (blush).

The limited edition looks cool, anyone have it?

katimus_prime wrote:I'm in Chapter 5 right now, and while the costume designs bother me quite a lot, the story is coming out much stronger and bolder than Xenoblade X.  There's a loooooooooot of Xenogears references that are making my heart skip a beat.  I'm not done yet, but if you have a Switch, I recommend it.  The combat doesn't flow like Xenoblade 1's does, but I do think it's a very worthy entry in the series.

I think the thing that bothers me most about the revealing costumes is that I don't think I'll ever have the guts to cosplay these really gorgeous characters because of how much of their bodies are exposed.  These characters are written amazingly and their agency is stellar, but I'm not going to pass this game to my 10 year old nephew, but I wouldn't pass Xenogears or Xenosaga to him, either.

If you pluck up the courage to cosplay them can you post pics, thanks

chaos wrote:

katimus_prime wrote:I'm in Chapter 5 right now, and while the costume designs bother me quite a lot, the story is coming out much stronger and bolder than Xenoblade X.  There's a loooooooooot of Xenogears references that are making my heart skip a beat.  I'm not done yet, but if you have a Switch, I recommend it.  The combat doesn't flow like Xenoblade 1's does, but I do think it's a very worthy entry in the series.

I think the thing that bothers me most about the revealing costumes is that I don't think I'll ever have the guts to cosplay these really gorgeous characters because of how much of their bodies are exposed.  These characters are written amazingly and their agency is stellar, but I'm not going to pass this game to my 10 year old nephew, but I wouldn't pass Xenogears or Xenosaga to him, either.

If you pluck up the courage to cosplay them can you post pics, thanks

yeah unfortunely you need to be well builts to cosplay some of these characters in the game

but the game and ost are gorgeous.

Lol I guess anyone can cosplay anything, but my own insecurities with my own body image hold me back. I might try to cosplay Malos because I definitely have the hips for it, but the costume is very intricate.

I'm on Chapter 7 now and it's gotten really good! As far as narrative and keeping plot holes from opening up, it's stronger than the original Xenoblade, but I haven't finished it yet, and I hang XB1 pretty high in my heart.

Glad to see some of you again, I was starting to get worried that a new Xenoblade game, rumors about remasters and the 20th anniversary of Xenogears wasn't enough to bring you out, hehe.

I don't want to talk to much about Blade 2 since many are still in the middle of it but I did get the limited (Europe) version, the controller and beat it in one intense week!